The Joy sisters are looking forward to twerking, grooving and dancing in New Orleans’ Caesars Superdome with thousands of Swifties this weekend.
And not only because they are huge fans of Taylor Swift, but because the singer has helped them grieve their mother’s death due to brain cancer.
‘Our mom introduced my sister to Taylor Swift,’ Chloe Joy Sexton, 18, from Memphis, Tennessee, tells me over Zoom. “It wasn’t even me.
It was her. She loved Taylor Swift and probably around 2012, 2013 said something to me that I will never forget: ‘I don’t believe people know how huge Taylor is and how much she is going to change the world.’
For Joy Sexton, that difference came in 2022 when her mom, Jennifer Joy, died of brain cancer. The 30-year-old cookie business owner and TikTok influencer has documented her experiences in tearful videos in the past two years.
She was left as the caretaker of her younger sister, Charlotte Joy who is 20 years her junior. She demonstrated elegant boxes that her mom used to store things that are special and valuable.
I remember her exact words: “My mom was so crafty,” she says. “She showed me how to sew, how to scrapbook, how to decoupage, how to embroider, how to make jewelry.”
One of the followers contacted Joy Sexton after reading her story and told her that they have visited the Eras Tour more than once. They were going to transfer two tickets for Joy Sexton and Charlotte to go to the New Orleans show.
The person said, ‘I think you deserve to go.’ ‘I want your sister more than anything to go,’ Joy Sexton says.
The big sister constructed five boxes, similar to how their mom would, for five of Swift’s eras: ”Lover,” “Fearless,” “1989,” “Speak Now” and “The Tortured Poets Department.”
‘It took me months to put together,’ Joy Sexton says before joking that five eras was the limit. ‘‘I could not have done 11 boxes at all.’’
After the Mod Podge had dried she placed each box, era by era, into a larger box like a set of Russian dolls. Joy Sexton was waiting for the right time to inform her sister.
‘If there was one thing our mom loved it was big celebrations,’ Joy Sexton remembers. I think Charlotte’s never been in a sport. I have never seen her challenge herself more than when she did cross country.”
Charlotte participated in a regional meet to run one mile. The determined elementary student tried to the last moment.
‘She arrived at the track very last, and that was very difficult for her,’ Joy Sexton adds. In the beginning of going into it she was not feeling well but she had to go in. She wanted to prove she could do it.”
‘I knew in that moment because I needed her to know how proud of her I was,’ Joy Sexton. She placed her phone on the floor of Charlotte’s bedroom the night of the race to capture a video of the Swiftie opening each box.
At the end, Charlotte reads a note from Joy Sexton: Since losing mommy you’ve become an amazing, strong girl who can find joy in the middle of the night. I am looking forward to making the whole place sparkle with you.
When Charlotte comes to know that she is going to the show, she gets emotional and hugs Joy Sexton tenderly.
‘I think there’s being a fan and then there’s having a person who has no clue you exist become this important to you,’ Joy Sexton explains.
While Charlotte is in the age of innocence, she had to grow into the fighter as she watched her mom struggle through radiation and chemo sessions until surgery and treatment were no longer possible.
“Charlotte is already so much stronger than most adults I know,” Joy Sexton says, “and not in a callous way but a very soft, calm, mature way.”
I do not wish her to ever lose that girl, that love and that pride in feminism. All that which defines or makes women be girls.
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The indomitable friendship between Joy Sexton and Charlotte was cemented through Swift’s narrative lyrics, how the singer has domesticated heartbreak — and all types of heartbreak including bereavement.
‘Taylor has a superpower,’ Joy Sexton says. It’s probably the most famous person on the face of the earth.
But none of that is as important to me as knowing that she’s a woman who has brought – through song – grief, girlhood, joy. She’s made it normal.”
But even if their mom will not be creating an Eras Tour memory box or attending the three-and-a-half-hour show, Joy Sexton will be there in spirit, dancing headfirst fearless.
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